Saturday, November 24, 2012

The same night I shared Anna Claire and Mallory's school pictures {see below}, they both came down with a terrible stomach virus. We're pretty lucky that the girls aren't really susceptible to stomach bugs all that often, so when one hits them, we are completely thrown for a loop. We never have pedialyte or Emetrol or carpet cleaner...

Fast forward two weeks to Thanksgiving and we've {finally} completely recovered...from the experience; the girls were feeling great about 24 hours later.

We've had a great Thanksgiving break, and I am so sad that it's almost over. Things kicked off with Anna Claire and Mallory's Thanksgiving program at school.

Mallory was thankful for bears, snakes, and deer. {???}

Anna Claire was thankful for Thanksgiving.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner at the river. The weather was perfect, but I got hardly any pictures.

Friday I hit the Black Friday sales. I'm not sure how much I saved, but I put a huge dent in the Christmas shopping list. The crowds really aren't that bad. Later that afternoon, I bribed Anna Claire and Mallory to ride into town for Christmas card pictures. They really had too much fun and we almost didn't come home with and pictures worthy of a card. They were really good, though, so we had brownies as a treat!

These won't be on our Christmas card...

Today we put up the Christmas tree and let Anna Claire and Mallory decorate the bottom.

While Walter and I took care of unpacking ornaments and stringing the beads, we occupied the girls by letting them make their Christmas cards to Santa. We gave them toy catalogs and a pair of scissors and let them cut out pictures of toys they want to ask Santa to bring. They put their pictures in envelopes for Ernie the Elf to take back to Santa tonight.

Anna Claire and Mallory slept in big girl panties all night for the first time and had no accidents! This is huge.

They have been potty trained forever but have refused to sleep in big girl panties. A few times we've run out of pull~ups and tried to convince them to sleep in panties to no avail. They scream and holler and we make the trip to CVS to buy more pull~ups.

Last night we had movie night, so the girls were in their jammies early. After the movie they used the potty and went straight to bed...none of us thought twice about pull~ups until this morning when they woke up.

We made a huge deal about it and they are so proud of themselves. Right now they are excited to sleep in big girl panties again tonight. We'll wait and see if they still fell this way at bedtime {waterproof mattress pads are already on their beds...just in case}.

Friday, November 9, 2012

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

We had a very busy weekend, so it was nice to get a "bonus day" today since schools were closed. I thought I'd be brilliant and vote early this morning before Walter had to be at work. Two hours later I was finally back in my warm, dry house. The girls and I spent the rest of the day inside...in our pj's.

We did lots of coloring and drawing...

...and I finally finished switching out the girls' closet and drawers . Yay! for no longer having to dress out of a pile of clothes in the corner of their room. I still don't think they have enough pants for really cold days. They've never been between sizes before and it stinks trying to find things that fit.

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Yikes! Here's how Anna Claire and Mallory occupied their time while I finished up the laundry...undressing all their princess dolls.﻿

I'm not sure if they were feeling overly patriotic since today was election day, but they both thought they'd strike a pose as the Statue of Liberty at the dinner table.

Monday, November 5, 2012

Mat Man finally came home from playschool with Mallory this weekend. She was sooo excited! She played with Mat Man all weekend sharing her Halloween candy, introducing him to friends,...

...and playing on the playground. We tried a new playground this weekend...the one where the old Doty Field used to be. Very nice and very clean, but not enough variety in toys for the girls to play on, so we headed over to our tried and true.

My new favorite pics of Mallory and Anna Claire...

Mat Man even went shopping with us Sunday. Kohl's, Target, and the outlets. Anna Claire and Mallory shopped with me for four hours and scored big with new school shoes, pajamas﻿, and dresses and pants from Gymboree.We even got a few Christmas gifts crossed off our list!

Thursday, November 1, 2012

The girls had such a great time trick~or~treating last night and were so cute in their My Little Pony costumes. They were SO excited {don't let Anna Claire's expression fool you} to run around the neighborhood asking for candy.﻿

They loved their costumes...especially the cutie marks. At first I wasn't sure how I would pull these off, because you can't just run down to the fabric store and buy a costume for a horse pegasus. I ended up using a cat costume pattern with some minor tweaks {yarn mane and tail, wings, and cutie mark}. They were thrilled with how they turned out {...and so was I}!

The backs of their costumes are actually cuter than the fronts...

I wish I'd gotten more pics of the excitement on their faces, but there was no keeping up with these two last night. Most of my pics are from behind. Here they are skipping down the street before it got too crowded...and too dark...and too cold!

They were so cute taking turns ringing door bells. They would always say "Trick~or~treat" and "Thank you," and Anna Claire would add "I hope you have a happy Halloween!" She's such a sweetie!

We did carve a pumpkin this year...without much fanfare. The girls weren't really into the cleaning out and carving part, but Anna Claire made sure the candle was burning...

Three streets and they were done...ready to come home and taste~test!

They helped Walter pass out candy for a little while. Almost $50 in candy and the basket was empty at 7:30!! That's crazy!

We hope you had a very happy Halloween!! I can't believe it's over...it will be turkey time before we know it!